Martha Clark (1643 - 1648)

Born 1643 in Duxbury, Plymouth Colony

Died 22 Jul 1648 at about age 5 in Plymouth, Massachusetts

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Biography

Martha Clark, daughter of Alice Martin and George Clark. She died 22 JUL 1648. Duxbury, Plymouth, Massachusetts. Aged: 4-5. Martha was murdered by her mother, Alice Bishop, a crime for which Alice was executed.

"In July 1648 a coroners jury reported that "coming into the house of the said Richard Bishope, we saw at the foot of a ladder which leadeth into an upper chamber, much blood; and going up all of us into the chamber, wee found a woman child, of about foure yeares of age, lying in her shifte uppon her left cheeke, with her throut cut with divers gashed crose wayes, the wind pipe cut and stuke into the throat downward, and a bloody knife lying by the side of the child, with which knife all of us judge, and the said Allis hath confessed to five of us at one time, that shee murdered the child with the said knife" Rachel Ramsden testified that when she went to Richard Bishops's house on an errand, "the wife of the said Richard Bishope requested her to goe fetch her some buttermilke at Goodwife Winslows, and gave her a ketle for that purpose, and shee went and did it; and before shee went, shee saw the child lyinge abed asleepe ..., but when shee came shee found [Alice Bishop] sad and dumpish; shee asked her what blood was that shee saw at the ladders foot; shee pointed unto the chamber, and bid her looke, but shee perseived shee had killed her child, and being afraid, shee refused, and ran and tould her father and mother. Moreover, shee saith the reason that moved her to think shee had killed her child was that when shee saw the blood shee looked on the bedd, and the child was not there". The child was Alice (Martin) Clarke Bishop's daughter, Martha Clark, by Alice's first husband, George Clark. On 1 August, 1648, Alice Bishop confessed she had murdered her daughter and said she was sorry for it. And on 4 October 1648 she was sentenced to be hanged, which accordingly was executed". ^[1]

Sources

1. ↑ Stratton, Eugene Aubrey. Plymouth Colony, Its History & People, 1620-1691. Salt Lake City, UT: Ancestry Pub., 1986. Print. pp. 159/60.

https://murderpedia.org/female.B/b/bishop-alice-martin.htm

• "Family Tree," database, FamilySearch (http://familysearch.org : modified 27 January 2018, 02:56), entry for Martha Bishop(PID https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/4:1:M46B-MXX); contributed by various users.
• Source: S1 Ancestry Family Trees Publication: Online publication - Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com. Original data: Family Tree files submitted by Ancestry members. Ancestry Family Tree Certainty: 0 http://trees.ancestry.com/pt/AMTCitationRedir.aspx?tid=87296995&pid=1599

See Also

• Watkins, Donna. "Diverse Gashes: Governor William Bradford, Alice Bishop, and the Murder of Martha Clarke, Plymouth Colony 1648." 2020. American History Press